Review of Far Beyond the Stars

I'm sure that many people like this as an exercise in social commentary, but it has essentially nothing to do with the fundamental premise of DS9 as a TV show. It essentially smashed the fourth wall and dropped any pretense that they were doing a show about the 24th century. It does not grow organically from any of the premises in the show. Benjamin Sisko has no emotional connection to racism at all. The very premise of Star Trek is that racism had long since ceased to exist. Neither he nor his grandfather nor his grandfather's grandfather would have experienced racism. It's a relic of history, so there would be no reason at all for him to dream about this kind of scenario (the episode doesn't even bother to explain why he experienced it). I also found Brooks' over the top scene chewing acting in the breakdown scene to be quite off-putting. I hated the character cliches, namely, depicting a left winger as the only white character strongly opposed to racism. Pabst gets no credit at all for hiring Benny in the first place, or agreeing to publish it as a dream story. He's just another example of the businessman that Hollywood loves to hate. Five stars for showing the regulars without their usual makeup.